aloin. his grandfather made a terrible mistake when he invaded the south. it would be a catastrophe if his grandson made the same mistake. that's "hardball." coming up next, the debut of "all in with chris hayes." good news and bad news today for the residents of mayflower, arkansas. the good news is than exxon announced they're developing an official plan to evacuate an oil pipeline that ruptured underneath a mayflower subdivision friday. the bad news is this is how the residents spent their easter weekend? >> so that is a pipeline that is busted and has flooded the neighborhood and is going all the way to the drain at the end of the street.

um, luckily our house is here, which is seemingly unaffected, but the smell is unbelievable. i mean, look. incredible. and that is oil. >> that is oil. more precisely, that is heavy crude oil from the tar sands of canada spewing out onto the lawns and sidewalks and the basketball hoops of the suburban area. the 20-inch mobile pipeline carrying the crude burst on friday, almost in two dozen homes in the area have been evacuated while the clean-up gets under way. the epa has classified it as a major spill. exxonmobil has not announced how much has spilled yet as of this evening they have cleaned up 12 million barrels. it was common to hear the residents say they didn't know they lived essentially on top of a 60-year-old oil pipeline.

and in the cable news business, the degree of an oil spill is determined by the pictures. these come from arkansas. most of these birds are been bathed at least once before the pictures were taken. just two days before the big suburban spill in arkansas, a train derailed in minnesota spilling 15,000 gallons of crude into a rural minnesota field. we don't know for sure whether that was also tar sands oil, but we do know it came from alberta. as for the pipeline that ruptured in arkansas, that pipeline used to carry crude oil from texas up north to illinois, but in 2006 because there were so much heavy crude oil coming out of canada, exxon reversed it so now it flows north to south. as america is projected to become the western hemisphere's hub for oil production, some

estimate we'll outpass saudi arabia by 2020, we have a view of what our oil fields can look like. this could be your neighborhood soon. they're set to do particularly at the keystone pipeline is ultimately approved whether it's fracking in your backyard or a pipeline under your subdivision, this is the future of fossil fuel america unless we decide collectively to join another future. joining me, bernie sanders, independent from vermont, may bouvier, from the grassroots climate change, and dan, a cnbc contributor, and we're joined by glen hooks of the sierra club of arkansas. no one from exxonmobil or the american petroleum institute was available to join us. glen, i'll begin with you. how big of story is it there and

what are residents being told? >> we're here in mayflower, arkansas. thanks for coffering the story. when you get off the freeway, you can really smell the oil spill. i spent some time today walking through the evacuated neighborhoods. there aren't a lot of neighbors around to tell their story, but the story is told by their oil soaked backyard, the smell in the street, and the fact that the tar sands oil has taken a chunk out of mayflower, arkansas. >> my producers and i were going through news accounts of the spill. it was so startling. almost no one seemed to know they were atop this oil pipeline. >> no, they don't know that. and actually, what exxon has been telling folks, the story seems to be that this is just regular old west texas crude. when in fact it is tar sands thick canadian oil coming from alberta, as you mentioned. this is a much bigger mess than a simple crude spill.

this is something if it gets in the water is going to sink. we're talking about dredging. you're right, not a lot of people knew it exists and didn't know it was carrying this dirty canadian tar sands. >> will you explain why it's harder to clean up this stuff than your normal crude? >> a lot of times when you have an oil spill, you can use skimmers and skim it off the water because the oil will float. this is not your typical crude oil. it's heavier, thicker, dirtier, therefore a lot more dangerous. if it gets in the waterways, it's going to sink, not going to float. you're talking about a potentially disastrous dredging process in an area that is right here in the natural state. not where you would expect to find canadian tar sands oil. >> a few years ago, there was an oil spill in kalamazoo, michigan, which was also this heavy oil. the epa staff that worked on this, had never encountered a spill of this type of material and this unprecedented volume under these kinds of conditions.

you get a sense of this is stuff that is different than what people are used to being able to clean up. >> right, so tar sands oil has the highest carbon content of any oil we know of. and right now, the spill we're seeing in arkansas is a devastating problem. and the real shocker about it, as you alluded to, is that this pipeline carries one tenth of what the proposed keystone xl pipeline would carry. imagine the photos we're seeing from arkansas times ten, and that overlaid over the ogalala aquifer in washington. >> i'm going to push back, not because i'm in favor of all for keystone. >> you're on record. >> pro oil spill. here is what the oil companies -- >> i would have loved to have hem. >> this is a brand new pipeline and is in fact much less likely to rupture than this 80-year-old pipeline.

we have dozens of pipelines running through, and unfortunately infrastructure on pipelines is the same as the infrastructure on bridges and roads and tunnels. that is it's falling apart and no one fixes them unless they need them. not that i'm in favor of this, it's a horrible tragedy. we do have hundreds of spills every year and this is going to be one they say the keystone pipeline helps out on. >> as a senator for the energy committee and someone who has talked a lot about the keystone, when you see these images, what is your response? >> my response is it reminds me of what happened in the gulf coast, it reminds me of exxon valdez, but i'll tell you what, chris, it really raises the border question. and that is whether we continue to be a carbon based economy, whether we finally recognize that if we don't get a handle on greenhouse gas submissions that this planet is going to be facing some disastrous problems in years to come. as a member of the energy

committee and the environmental committee we have talked to scientists and they say the estimations we made for global warming damage, we were wrong. good we don't get our act together and start cutting in a very significant greenhouse gas emissions, we're talking about this planet heating up by eight degrees fahrenheit by the end of the century. and that is calamitous for this planet. >> and here's the thing. there are alternatives, and you never hear about a solar spill. when you hear about a solar spill, we call it a beautiful day. >> okay, but keystone has become this kind of flash point for the environmental movement. and obviously, this being in the news is -- is useful. it's a catalyzing moment, right? as we all think about building this massive new pipeline. part is built, part is being built, the last part which crosses the border in the north is awaiting approval, and the idea here is the reason this is so important isn't just because you're going to get oil spills and that's part of it, but it's

that this will push us over into some new territory. but dan, the argument that gets made by the state department and their draft environmental impact study and by a lot of people is that oil is coming out no matter what. when you look at how much money there is to be made from it and the amount of capital investment firms are willing to do to extract it, that seems like there's something to do with the argument. >> and the spill proves to you, for example, that keystone is just one pipeline. and in fact, canadian sands are coming down to this country. even if the president were to disallow keystone from being built, it would not stop canadian oil sands from coming to this country. they will tell you they don't particularly need keystone xl in order to move the amount of canadian sands they want to move. it just makes things a whole heck of a lot easier. keystone already exists.

one of the issues you have to deal with is i think this is an important point that you have to take on keystone because it's a symbol, an important one. that shouldn't be lost. what should be remembered are the truths about canadian oil sands. they are coming into the country already. they will continue to come into the country. >> i think very simply, here's what the truth is, the truth is the president of the united states, the congress and the american people have got to say this is it. not only do we not want a keystone xl pipeline, but we have got to fundamentally transform our energy system away from coil, away from oil, and into energy and energy efficiency. people talk about economics. we're fighting for the future of the planet. we're talking about more and more sandies and irenes, which cost huge amounts of money in terms of rebuilding those communities, not to mention the future disasters that we'll see. >> yet, here strikes me as the problem. on march 22nd, a symbolic vote

in your august body, the senate, 72-37 against a symbolic resolution calling for approval of the keystone pipeline including democrats, quite a few, baucus, casey, connelly, and senator pryor of the great state of arkansas. >> i don't know how the president walks away considering he's appeared in the election period in front of the pipelines. he said he was waiting for the governor of alaska to approve routing. he's gotten studies. i don't know how he says no to keystone. even though he probably should. >> i want to ask after the break, how do you say no to keystone? and i want to hear your thoughts on your senator and how this might change his mind right after the break.

i have led the efforts in the house to support the keystone xl pipeline. project that would bring more north american energy to the marketplace. and put thousands to work.

the obama administration continues to block keystone using every bureaucratic trick and excuse in the book. it's now been more than 1,600 days since the initial permits were filed for building the pipeline. to put that in perspective, it took the united states a little more than 1,300 days to win world war ii and it took lewis and clark about 1,100 days to walk the louisiana purchase and back. the keystone xl pipeline is a no-brainer. >> all right, so that is a little snippet of a larger rhetoric that's emerged not just around keystone, but in our politics, we have seen the right particularly republicans become more reactionary on this issue, right? they have gone from this kind of this is a necessary evil to this is an affirmative good. drill, baby drill. steve stockman tweeted the other day, a quite conservative republican congressman from texas, the best thing about the earth, this was his tweet, the

best thing about the earth is you can poke holes in it and oil and gas will come out. if that's the direction the republican caucus is moving, if you have democrats here voting for this resolution, how do the politics on this shift, on keystone particularly? >> i think they shift, and they have shifted, by the way, when people watch their television and see what happened in new jersey and new york. when they hear scientists saying you're going to see this every year and it's going to be even worse. and people understand that. and when people see droughts in the southwest, and when they see flooding and they see heat waves all over the world, when people see their lakes aren't freezing over, they say, i may not be a scientist, i know something is wrong, and i understand that for my kids and for my grandchildren, we have got to do something about it. so i am not pessimistic about the future. i think with good organizations like 350.org, working with the grassroots, we can make the case, not only that we have to collect green house gas

emissions, we can create jobs. >> do you want to see the president not authorize the keystone pipeline? >> of course. >> your senator was one who voted for that symbolic resolution. i'm curious if that opens up the conversation with the folks in arkansas? >> it's a good excuse to stop by. we talked about it before, he's been a champion for it, but certainly, senator prior, as his father david pryor both had a sign on their desks that say arkansas first. when we look at mayflower today and the devastation that could happen, this could be a devastating type thing. if senator pryor puts arkansas first, he might reconsider this. i might also point out our congressman from this district, tim griffin, has been a champion of the keystone project as well. this is in his district. this spill is in his district. i want him to take a close look at this and see is it worth a few small amount of jobs for the

environmental risk that's at stake. i don't think so. so if you look at the local politics, it makes a difference, but i totally agree with senator leahy -- senator sanders, excuse me, about the environmental affect on a large scale. this keystone pipeline is bad news. we don't need it. it's going to shift the science in a way we don't need it. >> there's a coalition that has been built in opposition. even included the governor of nebraska, included a lot of ranchers. what we're dealing with here is an assessment of the risk, not just of the climate, but the basic risk of is this going to get in the backyard of your subdivision, and this is data from the federal government's regulatory body. and these are oil spills from pipelines over the last 20 years, 1993 to 2012, and there's not really any trend. you say the technology is

getting better. that does not indicate to me that the technology is getting any better. >> the infrastructure for pipelines has been basically the same for the last 70 years and the number of spills have been the same for the past 70 years. this is just part of the business and a bad part of the business. >> and we have to do better and we can do better. what has been so interesting in the keystone fight is it has brought climate change back into the focus, and we're working with the sierra club and glen and others to try and see how we can make president obama take this movement seriously. >> but can you get the tim griffins of the world? this to me is the big question. if we're going to price carbon, you have a fantastic bill if you don't mind me saying that you cosponsors that would put a price on the carbon. dan, i think you would agree. >> i think that's the real way to get back at exxonmobil. the only way -- >> we're not doing this out of punitive desire. >> but the only way you get them

to heel to task is to take away the economic advantages of getting oil sands out of the ground from canada. that means you have to put a price on what it is to take a canadian out of the athabasca or go into the gulf of mexico or somebody's backyard or go and get tide oil. the way you do that is put a price on what it is in terms of the effects it has on the environment. and once you do that, then it makes more sense for exxon to in fact pursue gasoline from algae as opposed to gasoline from natural gas or from oil sands in canada. that's where the rubber is going to meet the roads. economics. >> exactly, and the point has to be made that we now have the technology in terms of energy efficiency, in terms the decreased price for solar panels, in terms of the need for wind. we now can do it. if there was a political will in the white house and in the congress, we can transform the energy system. we can create millions of jobs.

we could lead the world and be an exporter around the world of that type of technology. that's the future, not oil and that's why the keystone pipeline should be defeated. >> we can't afford not to make that choice, in fact, and this is one of the most devastating projects on the planet. tar sands from outer space make the planet look like mordor. the scale of it is hard to comprehend. every three days, enough oil is moved in alberta to fill yankee stadium. >> my take away from this is we should reach out to tim griffin tomorrow to ask about his reaction to the spill and whether it's changed his opinion on keystone at all. and we should check back in on how this cleanup goes in kalamazoo, which is the most expensive on-ground oil spill in american history. senator bernie sanders of vermont, may bouvier, dan dicker, and glen hooks, thank you all so much. a massive institutional

scandal complete with theft, conspiracy, witness tampering and false statements, and the people at the heart of it just happen to be responsible for the futures of 52,000 children. that's coming up.

if you happen to be among the millions of people who watched the ncaa tournament last night, you watched as louisville cardinal sophomore guard kevin ware broke his leg in an awkward fall after a routine move.

an injury so gruesome it left players in tears and more than a few people i spoke with feeling sick to their stomach. one of those gasp moments. people who saw it in realtime howled out involuntarily at their tvs. everybody in the stadium, according to reports, was completely effected. social media blew up, and immediately after, people wanted to know if ware's leg was going to be okay and if he was ever going to play basketball again, and they also wanted to know, i wanted to know right away, if he wasn't going to play basketball again because of the injury, is he going to be able to go back to louisville next year and is he going to have a scholarship? if he isn't going to have a scholarship, what is going to happen to him? even if he does have a scholarship, who is going to pay for his medical bills? and most profoundly and urgently again, why isn't he being paid for his labor? that succession of logic is not an accident. the term student athlete, as taylor branch points out in the atlantic, is designed to help the ncaa in its fight against workmans compensation insurance

claims for injured football players. if a player was a student athlete, they were not by definition an employee and ergo not qualified for workmans comp if they got injured on the field. that means ncaa players are essentially the uncompensated employees of the cartel. players who literally as we saw risk their limbs on the court in order to produce a product that is immensely, immensely profitable. how profitable? in 2010, the ncaa reached a 14 year, $10.8 billion deal with cbs sports and turner broadcasting featuring just march madness. what does it mean for the basketball player? there happens to be a study that provides the number. football and men's basketball players at top sports schools are being denied $6.2 billion between 2011 and 2015 under rules that prohibit them from

being paid. what would the fair market value of these players be? $1.06 million over four years for the average men's basketball player. not including his scholarship. the number is higher, $1.5 million, for players, basketball players at bowl championship series schools. amazingly, and amazingly ironically, the most valuable team in all of college basketball is none other than kevin ware's louisville where the study estimates players are being denied $6.5 million each year in uncompensated labor. kevin ware doesn't have $6.5 million. but louisville's basketball program brought in $42.4 million in revenue during just the 2011-2012 academy year, according to numbers reported to the u.s. department of education. kevin ware's immediate career

and recovery will be paid for, but coverage in these situations is deliberately narrow and there are examples of players who incur horrendous bills, in some cases because they're not qualified for coverage. so louisville is under no obligation to re-sign kevin ware's contract. the good news, he emerged today from emergency surgery, which was successful, and he's expected to be discharged from the hospital tomorrow. the spokesman reported than doctors are expecting a full recovery. but for the university of arizona basketball player kevin hardwick, it's a different story. after a knee surgery, he was not taken care of. his mother said you believe your child will be taken care of on and off the court throughout their college career.

my insurance doesn't cover all of kyle's medical bills. that creates profit and revenue for the industry, is part of what made that level with kevin ware so gruesome. it was gruesome because of the severity of the injury, and the physical trauma, but it was also gruesome because in that moment where all of us were sitting and enjoying and watching the game, all the people making the money off it, including the advertisers and apparel companies had to reckon with the brief notion that that agony the kid was in was the very thing that made all of this possible. we'll be right back. the cat app, he opened up jake's very private world. at first, jake's family thought they saved ziggy, but his connection with jake has been a lifesaver. for a love this strong, his family only feeds him iams.

compared to other leading brands, it has 50% more animal protein... ...to help keep ziggy's body as strong as a love that reaches further than anyone's words. iams. keep love strong.

this is retired atlanta georgia schools superintendent beverly hall brandishing her superintendent of the year award. today, she's facing charges of

conspiracy and racketeering in one of the biggest public education scandals in american history. that story is coming up. first, i want to share the three awesomest things i saw on the internet today. the first, the story of pioneering rocket scientist brill. and since she wasn't a household name, let me tell you this woman was a scientific bad ass. she developed and patented something called the electrothermal hydrozine thruster and as the blog explained, it's a rocket propulsion system maintaining a geosynchronous orbit around earth. in other words, when satellites go up into space, they can be pulled off orbit, but the propulsion system she developed keeps them right where they need to be. it earned her the national medical of technology and innovation in 2011, but you wouldn't know that based on the lead paragraph of her obituary which reads, and i'm not making this up, she made a mean beef

stroganoff, followed her husband from job to job, and took eight years off to raise her children. the world's best mom, her son said. she was a trail blazer in her field, yet the times chose to mention her cooking skills and husband pleasing abilities. the good people of the internets didn't take kindly to this. after an avalanche of the tweets, the times changed the lead, taking out the beef stroganoff part and adding the brilliant scientist part. number two is a submission from our twitter fan, @autographcat. meet kid socrates. he will not only make you question the meaning of life. he will make you question your very place in the universe, sitting on a back patio, using ants as a metaphor, he gives the most succinct profound explanation of the universe. there's that line in the play

"six degrees of separation" where a father recalls his child's grade school class. spend enough time around kids and there's a socrates in all of them. and finally, a big reveal. >> the earth is just one planet in the galaxies. you can compare that to an ant on the patio in the backyard. the ant doesn't know there's more than the patio here. he just keeps walking. he doesn't know there's -- he's just part of lots of worlds. and the human race is sort of like that. >> and finally, a big reveal. our new hash tag. on the weekend, it was uppers. now that we're on primetime and you have been awake and functioning, that no longer works.

a friend of mine joked to me, we would be like the utah jazz of cable news. the jazz franchise began in the city of new orleans where their name was fitting before moving to the land of the great salt lake where it's charitably less fitting. we asked for your votes and the winners were inners. and my personal favorite was illinskys, so inners are the new uppers, and submit your click3 nominees to the hash tag #click3. and our facebook page, facebook.com/allin. we'll be right back.

suspects in an atlanta cheating scandal which involved more schools and teachers than any other in american history have until the end of the day tomorrow to turn themselves in. >> according to the district attorney's office, test answer sheets were altered, fabricated, and false lay certified. test scores were inflated, and did not reflect students' actual academic performance. >> these are 34 teachers, principals and other school officials indicted on friday. accused of covering up a scandal in which teachers would help thousands of students teach on standardized testing to achieve higher scores. as of now, zero have turned themselves in. the indictment paints a picture that awarded cheaters and covered up deception.

according to a report in the "new york times," teachers sat in a locked windowless room every week of testing raising students scores by erasing wrong answers and marking them right, but they allege it went all the way to top. also indicted was former atlanta schools superintendent dr. beverly hall. what makes it so remarkable was hall was a bona fide rock star. she was named superintendent of the year in 2009, earning her an invitation to the white house, and she also managed to earn over $500,000 during her tenure as superintendent. as testing becomes higher means of behavior and has president obama's race to the top reward teachers and schools for producing higher scores, we shouldn't be surprised this also incentivizes cheating.

we have seen the superintendent of el paso schools going to prison for boosting test scores along with investigations showing test irregularities and other states. this is not just a story about the atlanta school district. this is a story about the grand national experiment we're undertaking in public education in this country and its little discussed dark side. joining me at the table, goldie taylor, and atlanta resident, terrell bradford, executive director of better education for kids, and pedro novera. great to have you here. goldie, you're fresh off the plane from hot atlanta. thank you for coming. it's great to have you here. this must be a huge story in atlanta. >> it's a big story, but it has been for a long time. i was among the parents who hosted beverly hall. we were really looking forward

to, you know, a grand new day of reforms in the atlanta public school system. what we got was a widespread pervasive cheating scandal that is thus far unparalleled across the country. >> she was really popular, there for a really long time, maybe a decade, on the order of that, which is hard to find a comparison. and she became this kind of star figure in certain ways. and i think this is something we have seen across the country, which is the figure of the school turn around artist has become a kind of celebrity in our culture. michelle reese on the cover of newsweekly, and beverly had that stature in atlanta. >> it's ironic. she had that status among educators in the country, among the media. she quickly lost it among parents and teachers in atlanta. >> did she lose it before there was a 2011 report that was the precipitating event, which was a report by investigators of this

cheating ring. >> she did it on the basis alone, aloof, disconnected, unlike any superintendent we had. >> i can't comment on her style of leadership. i will say she was recognized throughout the country for what she had done. before we buy into the indictment, we have to acknowledge that -- >> good point. >> there was other data showing that the progress in atlanta was real. s.a.t. scores were reeled. nobody said they cheated, the naep scores were raised. >> which is a nationally standardized test. >> it's ironic we have a superintendent who is now, what, $7.5 million bail. we haven't -- >> 45 years, 45 years in prison. >> this is -- and we should not make light of cheating at all, and there should be accountability and a thorough

investigation, but there's not been an indictment yet against a banker in this country, and the disproportionate kind of pressure -- >> that's a cop-out, though. i mean, i agree with you. they should indict some bankers, but if you're running a cheating ring, you should pay some consequences. >> absolutely. so the real question then is was she running a cheating ring? >> right. >> and is this investigation that needs to occur here in atlanta going to really shed light on how it happened and why it happened, because atlanta is not alone. >> let me interject this quickly because this is important, right, i don't want to convict her on cable news. we never do that in cable news. if there's a cable news due process. this is someone who is under indictment. she has denied charges in the past. she also, and this is important, the statute that the indictment stems from is georgia's version of the rico, right? which is a conspiracy statute which is something prosecutors use to -- which often allows

them to sidestep showing some kind of direct moment of implicated guilt in the guilty party, right? if you're part of a conspiracy you should have known or did know, so one could say the fact they have chosen to indictment her using that statute is slightly exculpatory, just to put that on the table. >> i also don't want to tar and feather her on national television. she's got due process and she does maintain her own innocence, but i feel like on one side, the fact that the ostensible punishment, right, the bail, that it's sort of like a rico kind of gambino kind of thing, is sent a very strong message to communities in america that this can't be tolerated. this kind of behavior is absolutely unacceptable, particularly when the kids are, you know, overwhelming minority and overwhelmingly poor. they need the most transparency and the most help. >> which is the case. my kids attended atlanta public schools and graduated from atlanta public schools, but when

you look at the schools that were most impacted, they were the black and brown schools. 100 atlanta schools, 58 impacted. they are largely black and brown. to say that there is not a robbery going on here, when these teachers reap benefits, these principals reap financial benefits, which beverly harper herself reaped benefits while the same schools were robbed of their collective futures, i think there ought to be a high dollar for that when she's off on vacation today. >> we need to make a distinction whether she's accountable for this. >> even though you noted earlier this is like the largest scandal of its kind, under an investigation in the history of the country. it's 33 teachers and a superintendent and there are a lot more people doing the right thing, who are in classrooms, who are not behaving in this way. it's really important that when we find instances of this, and

if this is revealed to be what it certainly looks like, that you don't throw every other teacher under the bus. >> but -- >> but 33 are under indictment. there is supposedly hundreds who were fired. >> originally 178 teachers and principals. >> you can have to keep it in perspective, a new york city problem, a houston problem, a d.c. problem, and that begs the question, what is going on here? why is cheating become such a fixation in our schools? >> i want you to hold the thought because i want to answer the question after we take this break.

i don't get it. all this so we score higher on the state tests? if we're teaching the kids the test questions, what is it assessing in them? >> nothing, it assesses us. they can say the schools are improving. the scores stay down, they can't. >> juking the stats. >> excuse me? >> making robberies into larcenies, making rapes disappear. we juke the stats and majors become colonels. >> wherever you go, there you are. >> clause of my contract, we can play a wire clipping. just fyi. you tee up the question, the reason we played the clip is why are we? because we are seeing that in a lot of places. that usa today investigation was amazing and i think completely undercovered. why is the reason we're seeing that? >> the segment gets at it, when you put this kind of pressure on people, that is to say your

salaries, your bonuses, your school is going to be determined and effected by how well students perform, then you create an incentive for some people who are unethical to cheat. but you also do something else. you really cheat children of a well-rounded education. we have very clear evidence right now that kids' test scores are going up and they're still taking remedial courses in college because what they're good at now is taking a test. they still don't write well, they don't know how to problem solve. and this is the whole problem with the way we view the assessment under no child left behind. we have completely distorted learning so now kids are focused on preparing for a test, but they're not focused on how to be prepared for life, to think independently, and that's why arne duncan y had to name him, because he commended beverly hall. he deserves some of the -- he's culpable in this, too, because the whole administration under bush and obama, have put this

kind of pressure on schools to narrowly focus on test scores at the expense of inshrning that our kids are getting the education they need. >> i will tell you i think part of this is generational. when i grew up, i took standardized assessments all the time. and so to me, the statatorily, they were not linked to the amount of federal dollars that flowed in necessarily. >> so i was like 4. so they didn't share that with me, right, but what i knew was that -- >> i see what you're saying. >> what i knew is that i took them and at the time, i did not feel like i was getting any, you know, less of a great education. here is what the benefit of assessment is. assessments give us more information about where our kids are. and you can argue -- like, lots of views on nclb, race to the top, lots of people who don't normally agree on these things who agree there's a benefit here, but they're imperfect. we know so much more,

particularly about our neediest kids now than we did before no child left behind and that's about assessments and publishing data. >> there's assessments and then linking them to pay for performance and whether a teacher is fired or not or whether a principle is fired. we can have a world of assessment that stops short of where the assessments are tied to a performance ban. one of the things in baseball in the steroids era is people who hit more homer made more money and a lot of people started juicing. >> well they were corking the bats, but i have to tell you i understand and i agree with the context that says we overtest students based on very superfinishal goals, but at the end of the day, this is about integrity. we're talking about teachers sitting in a blacked out room, erasing and correcting answers for a student, and a principal standing guard at the door.

we're talking about teachers being threatened if they came forward. we're talking about writing memos that had to be burned after the meeting was over. i knew the people who investigated this. they are as straight shots as they come. >> let me say this also. the reason we know about this is two teachers blew the whistle. they wore wires, who felt so terrible about doing it. the most jaw-dropping detail was the school -- i think it's waller. parks middle school, christopher waller, they went from 24% proficiency to 86% in one year. and the jump was so much that they skipped through the level at which they qualified for federal money and walked away from $750,000. >> $750,000 while chris waller took home thousands of dollars in bonuses. that is theft.

>> is there a way to make assessments, this kind of central accountable mechanism that isn't going to have the negative affects here? is there a way to not throw the baby out with the bathwater? if we're going forward, the ways we should apply this? >> assessment has to be an integral part of learning. but what you want to do is remove the high stakes associated with it. you want to make sure that if kids didn't get it, that they get it. you know, come back and do it again until there's real evidence that kids are making progress. what we have done wrong, i think, is we have put this pressure on a single test, this moment in time when you take this exam, and what that has done is to undermine and deappreciate the rest of the whole year when we should be making sure the kids are excited